Aboriginal

Uncle Sam Watson mural

Alex Bainbridge reports that legendary Aboriginal activist Uncle Sam Watson has been memorialised in a new mural in West End's Bunyapa Park.

Former Sydney Swans player, anti-racism campaigner and 2014 Australian of the Year Adam Goodes was awarded an honorary doctorate from the Faculty of Health Sciences at the University of Sydney on September 30. The Adnyamathanha and Narungga man was named a Doctor of Health Sciences (honoris causa) for his work in supporting the Indigenous community, his charity work, his community leadership and his sporting exploits.

Thousands of people have rallied at cities across Australia in response to the footage coming out on ABC's Four Corners showing the torture of Aboriginal kids in the Darwin Don Dale correction centre. Rallies are demanding the people responsible be brought to justice and the Don Dale correction centre be shut down. Here are photos of the rallies: Sydney Photos by Zebedee Parkes
Photos from Invasion day rallies across the country where thousands of people marched for Aboriginal rights. Always Was! Always Will Be! Aboriginal Land! Sydney Photos by Zebedee Parkes
A 59-year-old Aboriginal man died in Darwin on May 21 while being held under controversial new “paperless arrest laws”. These laws give police the powers to arrest people for summary offences — such as “obscenity”, undue noise, offensive language — and hold them for up to four hours at a time. In NSW, a program that has been proved to prevent Aboriginal deaths in custody has lost funding under the federal government’s ironically named Indigenous Advancement Strategy.
Here's this month's radical record round-up, including a response to the "Reclaim Australia" rallies. What album, or albums, would you suggest? Comment below, on Twitter or Facebook.

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It's Fatal Miss Hood Payback Records Out now www.facebook.com/misshoodoffical Hard-hitting rapper Miss Hood comes from a long line of women warriors. Her ancestors, the Kunai and Gunditjmara people of eastern and western Victoria, put female fighters on the frontline. "Both of the tribes were matriarchal, so women were equal to men," says the Melbourne-based emcee. "It wasn't unusual to have women warriors as well as men warriors." Little wonder, then, that her music packs such a powerful feminist punch.
Sheplife Briggs Golden Era Records Released August 2014 Now touring www.iambriggs.com Briggs is 598 kilometres from his hometown of Shepparton - and he's missing his bed. "When I'm at home I don't have people ringing me up telling me I've got to get out of the house," says the rapper, sitting on his hotel room's balcony in Sydney.
Renegades Of Munk Renegades Of Munk Released September 2014 Impossible Odds Records www.renegadesofmunk.com Mark Munk Ross says he has learnt to make his music more appealing by injecting a big dose of humour into his hard-hitting songs. "I try to make them humorous, which then makes it accessible to fans that might not be that political," says the man better known as Munkimuk, the "Grandfather of Indigenous hip-hop". "But they are still digesting it, whether they know it or not," he says. "Smart game plan I think."
The Merry Grinchmas Mixtape MC Bunz Released December 25, 2013 Free download When Glen Anderson was playing sport with his schoolfriends, he was suddenly surrounded by police who ordered him to lay flat on the ground.
The Show Will Go On Mau Power Coming soon www.maupower.com Mau Power's new album takes listeners through the big changes in his life - and the first of those came when he was jailed. "In 2001, I got incarcerated," the Torres Strait Islands rapper tells Green Left Weekly. "And that time I was in lock-up for nine months." Mau Power, also known as Patrick Mau, was put away for grievous bodily harm after a street fight in the southern Queensland country town of Toowoomba.
January 26 is officially celebrated as Australia Day, but for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people (and anyone who values the truth) it is known as Invasion Day or Survival Day. This is the day when British colonial authorities arrogantly laid claim to this continent, opening an era of brutal dispossession, genocide and racism.

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